


Faulty Pillars

by gogollescent



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-13
Updated: 2013-04-13
Packaged: 2017-12-08 09:36:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/759873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gogollescent/pseuds/gogollescent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ziyal watches Garak in his shop. It doesn't really help his peace of mind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Faulty Pillars

Garak doesn’t look happy when he’s working on clothing, but he does look focused, like he’s present in just the one place and time. It's nice to watch his hands cup cloth; how Tholian silk fills his fingers like water, the color casting red shadows on the underside of his chin. In a funny way, it reminds her of her mother, who was determined to live life with gratitude, she said, no matter what it cost her—eventually, everything. 

Her mother wasn’t devout, but she used little heretic rituals to make up the gap, and she was superstitious in the way that even Bajoran atheists are; haunted by the knowledge that somewhere over her shoulder the heavens tracked her with a blue and unstable eye. It’s possible Garak wouldn’t appreciate the comparison. Still, Ziyal believes there’s something to it, some intrinsic faith that he places in the cutting laser and his little tailoring metaphors, which he trots out at the most inappropriate moments, like a dog who knows just one trick. Last week he tried to compare their relationship to a mixed-blend fabric. “Comfortable and wrinkle-resistent?” she asked him, and he said, “Goodness, I hope not,” poking the faint marks of wear beneath his jaw.

“You’re staring,” he says now, looking up from his silk. His expression is part bravado, part liquidy unease. She’d like to put a hand on his back and say,  _you can tap out now, really. These boots are so tight I couldn’t fit a phaser in them anyway._ _Doesn’t paranoia ever get old?_ But he’s sensitive about his age, and cowardice. That reminds her of Naprem too.

“A little bit,” she agrees instead. “Do you mind?”

“Not at all,” says Garak. “A slip of latinum for your thoughts, however.”

“I was thinking about how much like my mother you are,” Ziyal says honestly.

The expression on his face is better than the latinum would have been. “I’m sorry?” he manages, after a beat. She opens her mouth to repeat herself, but he waves her off. “And here I was laboring under the impression that Major Kira was your preferred maternal surrogate,” he says, folding the cloth down its length.

“I didn’t say you could  _replace_ her,” says Ziyal, and adds, “Nerys is teaching me how to knife fight,” with barely-restrained pride.

“Oh, wonderful,” says Garak.

“I just meant that you sound like her. Sometimes.”

“Such as when I am silently measuring new stock?”

“Does this mean you don’t want me to view you as a supportive adult figure in my life?” says Ziyal, changing tactics. Garak looks prim.

“Certainly not,” he says. “I’ve never supported anyone. Faulty pillars have been known to whisper disparaging remarks in my presence.”

“Then you’ll mind if I do this,” says Ziyal, putting an arm around his back and resting her chin on his shoulder. He tenses, but stays still, except for the hand he’s using to mark down the yardage. She can see how much effort it costs him not to look at her: there’s visible strain at the pale corner of his eye, and his eyelids are pulled up as though in shocky terror. “Extremely,” he says, but he shifts hands, so that the movements of his work don’t jostle her. He’s cool and solid, fully illuminated by the naked lights of his shop, and she tightens her grip on his waist; turns her face inwards, to the steep curve of his throat, like a beast blindly seeking its den.


End file.
